A Christmas for Hope Read Online Free PDF

tiny woman rub her hands across Lucas’s chest. Hope’s baby started doing kicks against her abdominal wall.
     
    She had no right to be angry. Lucas wasn’t hers to claim, she told herself over and over again in her mind. His family members started milling about; a few gave Hope curious glances. She dismissed their curiosity and kept her gaze on the woman with Lucas and the way she was pressing her body to his.
     
    “Is the baby Lucas’s?” The feisty older lady flopped down in the seat next to her.
     
    “No” Hope shook her head as she spoke.
     
    “Does he think it is?”
     
    “Definitely not. You’re his grandmother?”
     
    “The one and only.”
     
    “Who is she?” Hope nodded toward the couple at the end of the drive.
     
    “That is Michelle also known as the gold-digging skank that broke his heart. They were engaged while he was deployed. Then he was hurt in an ambush in Afghanistan and they couldn’t send him home until they could stabilize him. He was immediately taken to the VA when the Army was able to get him here. She took one look at him in the hospital room and ran out. This is the first I’ve seen her since then. Lucas always was a fool for her.”
     
    “Uh-huh…Oh.” Hope rubbed the underside of her belly.
     
    “Are you alright?” Grandma leaned forward, laying her hand atop Hope’s.
     
    The baby kicked again.
     
    “Kira always gets a little more active at the mention of Lucas’s name. I have yet to figure out why.” Hope moved her hand and let the elderly lady feel the baby’s actions.
     
    Lucas’s grandma’s hand rose and fell with the succession of movements. Hope met her clear gray gaze as the older woman looked up at her with delight on her face. Then a devilish smile appeared and Lucas’s grandmother pulled her hand away. Taking her cane in hand, his grandma leaned heavily on it as she rose. Straightening, she glanced over her droopy shoulders and winked.
     
    “Excuse me, everyone. It seems my grandson has been remiss in his duties of introducing his current fiancée, Hope, and their soon-to-be new addition to the MacIntyre clan, baby Kira. Everybody get over here and welcome this girl into our family proper.”
     
    All eyes turned openly on Hope as she sunk lower in the chair.
     

Chapter Four
     
    Lucas pulled his attention from the heavy post-Thanksgiving traffic to glance at Hope. She sat beside him in total silence with her eyes closed. She’d taken her ponytail down and her hair was splayed around her shoulders. After the day they’d had he couldn’t blame her for being worn to the bone, tired. He dug his fingers into the supple leather of the armrest separating them. What he really wanted to do was place his palm on her belly and feel the baby that grew within her move around.
     
    He could seriously maim his grandmother. As he tried to diffuse the situation with Michelle and get a grasp on what it was she wanted, his dear old granny dropped a bomb. Now everybody in the family with the exception of his father, who kept giving him strange looks, thought the baby was his and were too busy congratulating him to realize the timeline was way off. Hearing Giselle’s announcement, Michelle threw a hissy fit and he still didn’t know what the hell she wanted. Worse, Hope hadn’t said a word. He saw his chances with her diminishing by the minute and desperate times called for desperate measures. He took a sharp turn that had them both leaning over.
     
    “Will you please stop doing that? Where are you going now?” Hope pushed off the center console.
     
    “We left so quickly after dinner that I got to thinking. We didn’t get a chance to decorate the Christmas tree.”
     
    “It’s too early for a tree.”
     
    “It’s a tradition. We always decorate a tree after Thanksgiving dinner. So...i.e.…you need a tree.”
     
    “Then drop me off, go home, and decorate your own damn tree.” Irritation hung heavy in her voice.
     
    “Anything you want to